Carla hurried down the corridor, with coffee in hand and file folders under her arm. She hated to be late for these meetings, but she had just received some new information that might help with the decision-making today.
10:02 glared the large clock at the head of the room.
“Sorry I’m late,” said Carla, putting down her folders onto the conference table at her place. Pulling her wallet from her purse, she retrieved two dollars and placed them in the center of the table. Despite all the changes the company had undergone during the past year, it maintained this one ceremony—a dollar a minute for lateness. Some time-management consultants had recommended it years ago to the executive committee as a means of disciplining themselves, and it stuck. They just loved it; now every meeting involving directors and above is run by this rule. The pot, when the fine was a quarter a minute, used to come up to enough after a year to buy pizza for the entire company staff. Now, with inflation, the fine was up to a buck, but the resulting improvements in timeliness led to fewer pizzas overall.
“Glad we’re all here. Thank you,” said Johnson, the CEO. “You all interviewed Morgan and Tom for the new director of communications job and this meeting is to share our impressions, review what information we got from references, et cetera, and make a decision. Are we all on board with that?” he asked, looking around the room at the members of the selection team assembled in the conference room.
Heads nodded around the table.
Carla handed out two candidate packets to each member of the team. These contained the results of their interviews, reference checks, background checks, and assessments from the executive recruitment firm. “The cover sheet gives the summary of all that we have. I’ll give you a minute to read through it,” she said, as they perused the page while she took out some other notes from her pile.
“It’s pretty obvious that they’re in a dead heat according to the competency list. They both got high marks from their references on understanding the business, building external relationships, oral communication style, written communication, and business acumen. Morgan did a bit better in problem-solving and decision-making overall, but one reference said he tended to take on too much of the detail work himself and did not delegate enough. Tom got the opposite review; he tended to delegate too much, sometimes handing off details his last boss thought he should have handled himself.”
“I got the same impression during my interviews,” said Nate, the hiring manager. “Tom told me he liked to develop his people, and delegation was a means to that end. Morgan did not seem to think doing it all himself was a problem; actually, he was quite proud of the fact. But then he didn’t have the same staff level as Tom.”
The conversation continued with a detailed review of the remaining competency areas. At the end of this topic, the two candidates were about even in their attractiveness to the group.
“Any developmental areas mentioned?” asked Johnson, paging through the reports.
“Yes, on the next page you’ll see them listed. Tom has not had much exposure to the rest of the business side; he has primarily been in communications. Morgan, on the other hand, came to communications from a marketing background,” answered Carla, “so he’s had more exposure.”
“I like that about Morgan,” added Nate. “While Tom did have an appreciation for the business based on his MBA, Morgan could really talk to the day-to-day issues. I’d have to score him higher on that one.”
“How about Morgan; did he have any developmental areas?” asked Johnson.
“Yes, he had very little supervisory experience in his career. He started as a market analyst and then moved up into a senior-level position, still as an individual contributor. He made a lateral switch to communications because they had an opening and he had always liked journalism,” responded Nate. “Morgan moved up twice in three years, but it was only in his last job that he got to supervise people.”
“So delegation would be one of his developmental areas,” added Carla, making a note on her file. “I did get some feedback on Tom’s style from one source, who suggested Tom was pretty tough on his people. No real information about Morgan’s management style from his references.”
“I spoke with Morgan at length about his supervisory style, and although he doesn’t have much hands-on experience, he said all the right things,” added Nate.
“I got the same impression,” said Carla. “Morgan came across with a lot of management theory, but he really didn’t have the experience.”
“Well, I think we can take care of that with some training,” added Nate.
The group continued to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of each candidate, sharing their personal impressions as well as the data from the references.
“How about their abilities to handle the media issues we’re facing. What are your thoughts?” Johnson asked, looking toward Nate.
“Regarding Tom,” Nate started, “I liked the fact that he had quite a bit of media exposure and personally represented his company during one of their product crises. Morgan has had almost no face time with the media. He did, though, create a sophisticated communications plan, which I circulated to you about a week ago.”
“What did the tests show?” asked Johnson, referring to the battery of psychological tests that every top-level candidate takes as part of the hiring process.
“Tom was more outgoing and assertive, almost too much so,” reported Carla, “and Morgan came out reserved, maybe not assertive enough. However, overall, the results were interesting.”
“Interesting?” asked Johnson, smiling. “That’s a new one. What do you mean by ‘interesting’?”
“Both came out well on conscientiousness, openness to ideas, intelligence, and socialization,” continued Carla, “but, surprisingly, Tom’s scores were the highest the consultant has ever seen in a businessperson.”
“Say more about that,” said Nate, moving forward in his seat.
“There are certain ranges we look for, specific to each open position. Morgan did well, high enough on all scales to be a good fit. However, Tom got perfect scores on all the scales. I’m not really sure what that means, but I do wonder how he could have done so well.”
“Maybe he’s a perfect fit for us?” asked Nate.
Johnson looked at his watch and told the group that he had another appointment to prepare for. Getting up from his seat, he suggested they continue the meeting without him and asked them to let him know of their decision by the end of the day.
Discussion Questions
Hiring and Selection: The First Line of Defense
This section will focus on how the company can forestall the hiring and promotion of corporate psychopaths. While no procedure is a guarantee against infiltration, vigilance based on greater understanding can improve one’s defenses.
We start by briefly summarizing the typical personnel procedures used by businesses to hire and promote employees. We invite the reader to look for potential weak spots or loopholes in these processes where a psychopath might be able to slip through or operate unnoticed, and we will also offer suggestions for closing some of these entry points.
Managing the human assets of an organization is one of the most challenging functions of the executive, and the ability to identify and handle problematic individuals is critical. The human resources department is responsible for finding and hiring new employees, administering compensation and benefits programs, managing employee and (where applicable) union relationships, developing and providing employee orientation and training programs, and administering the performance appraisal and talent development processes. Some larger HR departments also provide coaching and guidance to executives on change management issues, executive development, and succession or replacement planning.
The most value-adding HR management function centers on finding, attracting, and retaining talented staff. The hiring manager with a vacancy to fill, and coworkers who are working overtime to fill the gap in the interim, sometimes wonder why it seems to take a long time to hire someone. The answer lies in the screens or hurdles through which the candidate must pass before receiving an offer of a job.
In general, the hiring manager first reviews the work required and possibly redefines some of the requirements contained in the job description. This can be a tedious process, but it is critical to making a good hire. The next step is to advertise the open position on a company job-posting board and on the Internet. If the job is at a sufficiently high level or requires very specific expertise, the company may retain a professional recruitment firm to prescreen candidates. The next steps are critical to protecting the organization from hiring a possible psychopath.
Screen Résumés Carefully
Before the advent of the Internet, companies might receive perhaps ten résumés for any given opening and then have to review them manually. Today, Internet advertisements could lead to stacks of résumés from candidates, but algorithms automatically screen them, looking for key words that match criteria for the job description. The major weakness in using a résumé as a screening device is, of course, the tendency for applicants to overstate or falsify their qualifications, and computer algorithms are not sophisticated enough to tell the difference between truth and lies. Certainly, applicants will tailor details on their résumés for a specific company to reflect a better match between their own knowledge, skills, and abilities and those described in the company’s advertisement. This is actually a smart approach to take, as it highlights what is important to the hiring company and often includes key words for which the algorithm is screening. This may get the candidate through the first hurdle. However, tailoring a résumé assumes that one truly has the qualifications and experience required.
Psychopaths, notorious liars, often will cross the line between good marketing and outright lying. In our work with psychopaths, we have seen résumés that contain jobs the applicant never held, companies that never existed, promotions that never happened, professional memberships that do not exist, awards and commendations never received, letters of recommendation written by applicants themselves, even fake education, degrees, and professional credentials, among other things. To uncover possible psychopathic deceit, it is essential to verify every piece of information contained on the résumé before starting the interview process. This is time-intensive but worth the effort. Typically, however, verification of résumé data starts after the interview phase. This puts the hiring manager at a disadvantage during the interview, because she has only the résumé data to go on and the psychopath is so good at justifying what she has written.
At the very least, education should be checked before the initial interview by contacting the registrar’s office at the university cited. Sometimes applicants misrepresent their actual degree by substituting something that sounds more impressive (for example, engineering is a more difficult field of study than engineering technology). Also, because advanced degrees often require the writing of theses or dissertations, and experienced technical professionals sometimes write articles and scientific papers, cautious companies may find it worthwhile to get a copy of these documents and let their technical staff read and assess them. Google Scholar is a good resource for this purpose. Professional credentials and licenses, especially those granted by the government to protect the public, such as in the fields of medicine, psychology, engineering, and others, can be checked through the appropriate authorities. Online databases can be searched quite easily. Google can also be very helpful in obtaining information about candidates, some of whom will have their own web page.
Unfortunately, other than uncovering the most outrageous lies, it is difficult to assure the accuracy of this initial screen. In general, an impressive résumé requires deeper digging to assure that your impressions are accurate.
Telephone Screening Interview
An initial telephone (or Skype, Zoom, or FaceTime) screening interview saves considerable time and expense and allows for consideration of a larger pool of candidates. It is an ideal way to get to know the candidate on a more personal level and to collect more details about his or her work experience. Typically, it is possible to explore a candidate’s motivations and personal interest in the job by asking open-ended questions like, “Tell me more about . . .” and “What got you interested in applying for this job?” Well-informed candidates will catch glimmers of what interviewers are looking for, and strategically offer examples of work experience that respond to their often unspoken concerns; those with good communication skills can advance their candidacy. Psychopaths, of course, are quite astute at noticing what others need to hear and will begin their verbal manipulation during this interview; however, it is nearly impossible to differentiate them from legitimate applicants at this time. Even having the benefit of nonverbal cues during video calls cannot guarantee that the interviewer will accurately spot lies and distortions.
Ideally, a company may wish to record these interviews (with the applicants’ permission) and allow other staff to review them. They can then prepare lists of follow-up questions to ask during subsequent, face-to-face interviews. The conversational and manipulative skills of psychopaths can fool even seasoned psychopathy researchers, who then find during subsequent review of the tapes that the candidate’s banter contains excessive use of flowery phrases, inconsistencies, lies, distortions, discrepancies, and bad logic. Moreover, these researchers have the advantage of collateral information (such as criminal records and psychological assessments) about the psychopaths, which the company might not have. On the other hand, interviewers must be careful not to place too much credence on subtle discrepancies gleaned during these interviews. Despite the ubiquity of telephones, many people are not at all skilled in speaking over them, especially when stress takes over good judgment and smooth conversation, as is often the case during a job interview. Certainly younger candidates prefer texting to virtually any other mode of communication, which puts them at a disadvantage during telephone calls and face-to-face meetings. At the very least, though, the interviewer should take detailed notes about any inconsistencies, and should use them to address concerns in follow-up interviews.
Face-to-Face Screening Interview
Candidates who pass the initial phone screen receive invitations for face-to-face interviews with HR staff, the hiring manager, and, in many cases, a technical person from the department with the vacancy. The perspective of each is different, but they share the common goal of finding out as much about the candidate as they can in a limited amount of time in order to make an informed hiring decision.
The HR staff often thinks that it has the best chance of determining the “people skills” and “fit” of the applicant. Some hiring managers also expect the HR staff to determine the mental health (a generic term, often misused) of the applicant. This is clearly an unreasonable expectation as, short of a psychological assessment, formal evaluations of mental health are not possible by untrained interviewers—and perhaps not even relevant to a given job. Keep in mind that psychopathy is not a mental illness.
Surprisingly, many managers make two critical mistakes when approaching the employment interview, and both play directly into the hands of a psychopathic candidate. Some do not prepare the right questions for the interview; some do not prepare any at all! Good candidates have a clear and legitimate agenda: they want the job, they want to advance their career, and they want to work for a particular company. To candidates, the interview is the chance to impress the company with their ability and motivation to do the job. They will have rehearsed their presentation and answers to potential questions, and they will have read books on interviewing techniques and have ready answers for the most common questions, including the challenging ones, such as “Tell me your greatest weakness”; “How would you handle it if . . .”; and “If you could do something differently in your career, what would it be?”
Psychopathic candidates also have a hidden agenda: they want to play “head games” with the interviewer, and their goal is to get money and power because they feel entitled to it—not in exchange for real work. The employment interview is the ideal setting for the psychopathic candidate to shine. Therefore, it is well worth the time and effort for the hiring manager to prepare questions carefully designed to elicit the specific information needed to make the right choice and to force the candidate to go beyond pat or rehearsed responses.
The second mistake some managers make is not attending a training program on interviewing techniques, believing they do not need it because their social skills and experience will suffice. Some interviewers use a free-flowing, unstructured approach to the interview and rely on “gut feel” or personal impressions, a style that goes against most of what we know about good interviewing techniques and, unfortunately, leaves the average interviewer open to manipulation and sophisticated impression management by a psychopathic applicant.
Many training programs on interviewing techniques are available, and best practices suggest a format similar to this:
The Opening. Handshakes, offer of a beverage, inquiry about travel to the interview site, and talk of the weather are common icebreakers that help break the tension of a face-to-face meeting and pave the way for the real work.
Initial Exploration. General questions about the candidate’s background, experience, expertise, education, and interest in the job, typically following the résumé format.
Detailed Questioning. Probing for specific aspects of the applicant’s background that seem to be relevant to the open position.
The three levels of responses for which a trained interviewer listens: overt answers to questions; the impression the candidate makes on the interviewer; and the underlying competencies, motivations, and values the answers reflect.
First, overt answers address questions and/or concerns about issues like:
Second, as the candidate speaks, the interviewer develops impressions that can include:
Third, gleaning underlying competencies, motivations, and values.
One common mistake interviewers make is to concentrate only on the overt answers and their own impressions and not to consider underlying, and transferable, competencies, motivations, and work values. It takes a lot of work to construct probing questions that will elicit this information and a lot of interviewing experience to be able to interpret responses correctly. Good listening and note-taking skills are critical, as is a keen ear for the inconsistent, exaggerated responses offered up by psychopathic candidates.
Providing Information About the Job and the Company
The more candidates know about the day-to-day ins and outs of a job, the better able they are to decide for themselves whether there is a good match between their aspirations, competencies, and what the job has to offer. A candidate who opts out of a job because of information learned during an interview saves both parties additional time and energy. A common mistake made by interviewers, though, is to spend so much time in describing the job and their department that the interview time flies by without asking important probing questions. Candidates are naturally reluctant to interrupt, and psychopathic candidates will use this time to feed the interviewer’s ego.
Follow-up on Concerns
If the candidate reveals only bits of information, glosses over details, or makes comments that just do not sit right with the interviewer, then this is the time to circle back and probe more deeply. For example, when a candidate states, “My team won the company award for bringing the project in under budget and ahead of schedule,” the interviewer may wonder:
The follow-up-on-concerns phase is the time to pursue these and other details that do not jibe or that conflict. Inconsistencies and discrepancies may be the result of hasty answering or the result of purposeful distortion, exaggeration, or outright invention. The interviewer drills down in order to get a good read on actual skills and true motivations. A typical question asked during this phase of the interview might be, “I’d like to go back to your description of the project team you were on. What was the specific role you were assigned?” (The candidate answers.) “What was your relationship like with . . .” and so forth. This line of questioning is sometimes difficult for less experienced interviewers to execute, yet pointed questions may be the only way to satisfy concerns, and perfectly clear answers should be the only way for the candidate to maintain his or her candidacy. Again, analyze answers on many levels, thus providing more information about competencies, motivations, and values.
The Close
Candidates will want to know what the next steps are in the hiring process, and the interviewer should have an answer that is appropriate to the situation. And the company must honor commitments regarding follow-up.
Following are suggestions for hiring managers to improve the effectiveness of their interviewing process, based on our experience working with corporate psychopaths (and the companies who have unwittingly hired them):
Retain Control of the Interview!
Psychopaths perform exceedingly well during an interview primarily by avoiding answering direct questions, instead introducing topics into the conversation that they believe are interesting to the interviewer in the hopes of building rapport. This is an easy trap to fall into; before you know it, the candidate is interviewing you and has derailed your plan. Recall that the first step on our corporate psychopath’s agenda is to convince the hiring manager/team to make a job offer even if the candidate lacks the necessary knowledge, skills, or experience. Psychopaths quickly ascertain whether the interviewer will respond better to a soft sell or a hard sell, and they experience little social anxiety and discomfort during conversations that most would find daunting. This allows them to weave convincing tales of professional experience, integrity, and competence, and to use an array of technical terms and jargon with such confidence and panache that even some experts are fooled, although an astute interviewer might be able to determine whether or not these tales reflect more than a superficial knowledge of the topic. Even so, the task will not be an easy one.
When challenged on any detail during an interview, the psychopath will simply shift gears, subtly change the topic, and generally weave an altered tale so believable that even an interviewer who knows the individual is lying might have doubts. The psychopath’s goal is to convince the hiring staff that he has the ideal background, experience, and motivation to fill the job, and the personal attributes to fit right in on day one. The psychopathic fiction, “I am the ideal employee,” can be very seductive.
Ask for Work Examples
It is customary in the arts and entertainment field for job candidates to show up with examples of their work in the form of a portfolio, filled with photos for models, movies for visual media professionals, and articles for journalists. This allows the hiring manager to judge the candidates’ quality, style, and appropriateness to the open position. In the case of business job candidates, the hiring manager should ask to see examples of actual reports written, presentations made, and projects completed. These, of course, should have any identifying or confidential information blanked out, but the manager can read and judge the great bulk of the work, giving the hiring company a good indication of the type of work output to expect from each candidate.
While we would not be surprised if an enterprising psychopath created a phony report or found one on the Internet just to satisfy a potential hiring company, the effort may be more than most psychopaths are willing to invest. If you suspect that the candidate has falsified or plagiarized the portfolio, the only option may be to drill into details behind the actual report. However, this approach assumes that the hiring manager has the technical expertise to do so, and, if not, knows to call on a staff technical interviewer.
Focus on Action and Behavior
Some interviewees speak vaguely about their past without providing sufficient detail about what they really did. Others exaggerate their contributions, giving themselves the appearance of being more important to the outcome than they actually were. A full answer should include a statement about achieving some goal or solving a problem, followed by a review of the actual things the candidates did, whether directly or tangentially, to address the goal or issue, and, finally, the outcome of their efforts, including what impact their efforts had on the results.
Clarify Details
As noted above, when faced with responses that do not provide sufficient details, the interviewer must go back during follow-up questioning to flesh out the complete picture. The interview should redirect candidates to specific areas of interest as much as possible. “Who, what, when, where, and why” types of follow-up questions can help get to the truth behind the experience being described.
Supporting roles are quite important, and the job being filled may require this sort of background and experience, but supporting roles are very different from supervisory and management roles. It should be easy for the interviewer to clarify the level of authority the candidate claimed by pressing for details. Psychopaths pay little attention to detail and in fact, due to their tendency to be easily bored, they will not respond well to detail-focused questioning. There can be many reasons for the candidate to continue to provide vague and rambling answers, including nervousness and forgetfulness, so the interviewer should keep this in mind while pressing for details in search of the truth.
Look for Appropriate Feelings
One of the hallmarks of a psychopath is the inability to express a full range of normal emotions. For example, when telling a story that would normally elicit visible emotional reactions in most people, psychopaths may come across as cool and shallow, or as B-grade actors. Psychopaths do not understand what others mean by their “feelings,” yet they will attempt to mimic them on demand. This often leads to superficial expressions or even exaggerations of emotion inappropriate to the event they describe.
Book and colleagues (p. 91)1 found that, with careful observation of others and with practice, those with the interpersonal and affective traits of psychopathy (PCL-R Factor 1; Table 2.1) may have an “ability to accurately mimic emotional expression (fear and remorse) leading others to perceive emotional genuineness.” Elsewhere, Book noted, “It’s difficult to spot a psychopath; in fact, they can look actually like they’re more genuine than other people. Part of it is that most people do not have to fake emotions all the time, so they do not have any practice at it. But someone who doesn’t feel these emotions will have practice at faking them, so they will probably be better at it.”2 See S 11.1: Does Practice Make Perfect?
Recent research on the use by psychopaths of verbal and nonverbal behaviors is shedding some light on how they are able to provide convincing accounts of themselves and their achievements, and to manipulate others so well. For example, they may be animated speakers, use many hand movements (perhaps as a distraction from what they are saying), express what appear to be genuine smiles, and use aggressive language to gain dominance over others. For a review of this research, see S 11.2: Politics and Poker: A License to Lie.
Displays of emotion commonly expressed by psychopaths during an interview might include indignation, anger, or exhilaration, as, for example, when describing being passed over for a promotion, the termination of a close coworker, or passion for one’s work, respectively. Expect some display of emotion during these expositions. However, excessive, or over-the-top, emotions might raise questions about the candidate’s emotional control and judgment regardless of the reason—psychological or otherwise. Sometimes the absence of an emotional component to an answer may also raise questions. The key is to look for emotions appropriate to the story line and to be sensitive to how realistic (as opposed to superficial) these emotional expressions appear. This is the one time when “gut feel” and the interviewer’s “emotional antenna” have a valuable place in the interviewing process.
Take Notes
It is easier to recall impressions and feelings about the candidate than facts, so it is the best practice to make detailed notes during the interview on the résumé itself or the list of questions provided by human resources. These notes should be clear enough that others reading the document could decipher them. It is also useful to review these notes prior to the follow-up-on-concerns phase. Simply telling the candidate that you need a moment to review your notes is a reasonable request, often welcomed by a candidate, who may wish to take a break.
Do Not Decide Alone
A well-structured hiring process will include a meeting of interviewers—a selection committee—to discuss the qualifications and relative merits of the candidates. This is a best practice because different interviewers see different strengths and weaknesses in any single candidate, which they should compare and discuss. Nevertheless, it is an invaluable requirement in the case of screening out a potential corporate psychopath. Recall that psychopaths attempt to build private one-on-one relationships with those who have utility to them. This now would include all interviewers and decision makers involved in the hiring process. As astute students of human psychology, psychopaths will easily ascertain the specific psychological needs and wants of each interviewer and then customize their approach to best advantage. On the surface, each interviewer will come away with a positive impression, and, to the degree that decision-making relies on this good feeling, they will all agree that the psychopath is the ideal candidate, almost “too good to be true.”
Now, by increasing the number and varying the types of interviewers (beyond the human resource professional and hiring manager), the chances of finding discrepancies that lie behind the “ideal employee” façade increase. Therefore, expanding the interview schedule with a technical expert, a future peer and/or subordinate, the current job holder (if still on staff), a member of upper management, and even the department staff assistant, can provide different perspectives that might uncover important information; we know that psychopaths treat individuals differently depending on their perceived utility and status. Psychopathic responses to “low-status” interviewers may include condescension, flirting, disparaging side comments, and displays of entitlement, among other things. “High-status” interviewers may provoke discussion of overly ambitious career aspirations and expectations, bravado and deceitful boasting, and even the disparagement of a “lower-status” interviewer. By getting all of the interviewers in a room together for a discussion of the candidates, the selection committee can flush out these discrepancies and critical inconsistencies, and possibly deceitful claims can be uncovered. A good meeting facilitator will get each person to share his or her impressions, feelings, and facts about each candidate. They then list the positive and negative aspects of the slate of candidates, and make the final selection.
Certainly, adding interviewers to the schedule is time-consuming, expensive, and logistically challenging, and is not always feasible when the open position is an entry-level one. For example, with candidates just out of college the interviewer may have little to go on, save their academic performance, coursework, and college extracurricular experiences. However, such individuals, if they are truly (or potential) corporate psychopaths, could cause many problems down the road if they slip past the company’s defenses because they were not evaluated sufficiently.
Know Thyself
The objectives of psychopaths are to ingratiate themselves with their targets, establish trust, talk their way through any inconsistencies, build strong relationships with those in power, and then take parasitic advantage of everyone. During employment interviews, psychopaths will quickly assess the interviewer’s value system, personal needs, and psychological makeup, and then tailor their speech and behaviors to make a good impression. A worst case would be for the interviewer to be so gullible that he does not challenge the data contained on candidates’ résumés, or does not push back very hard on vague reports of their performance on the job. A perceptive interviewer will push past subtle attempts at influence, stick to the interview agenda, and avoid making the decision alone. A team of interviewers sharing information is the best defense.
However, only by having a clear understanding of one’s own strengths, weaknesses, biases, and idiosyncrasies can the interviewer hope to maintain the course of the interview and not fall prey to ingratiation. This is not an easy task, as it requires personal insight, which we will discuss in a subsequent chapter.
Executive Hiring and Promotion
When trying to fill technical positions, such as chemists, engineers, computer programmers, and financial analysts, there are clear requirements of what they have to know and specific experiences that they had at various points in their careers. The selection of a senior manager is significantly more difficult, as the nature of the executive’s job is so amorphous or so tailored to the individual that it is difficult to ascertain exactly what is required. It should be obvious to the reader by now that a good job description is critical to understanding the qualifications sought in new hires and promotional candidates. Unfortunately, many executives we have met just do not have adequate job descriptions with which to work.
In addition, as we have pointed out, there is some overlap between things psychopaths do and good executives do, at least on the surface. A complete understanding of the differences is important because one can be mistaken for the other, and the amount of damage a high-level bad hire can do to the organization can be significant.
Succession Planning
Succession plans provide orderly continuity of leadership, and they are the most effective means of identifying and grooming leadership talent. Formal succession planning can be cumbersome, but if well designed, it can minimize the chance of a corporate psychopath slipping through. Like the hiring process, succession planning is composed of several screens or hurdles through which potential future leaders must pass. In many companies, the person in charge of succession planning solicits recommendations from key managers about subordinates who have the potential for higher levels of responsibility, or more generally, the “right stuff.” They base the initial evaluations on information gleaned from performance appraisals, record of accomplishments, and personal interactions with the manager making the preliminary recommendation.
A succession planner will have access to formal assessments of the candidate, often including a “360-degree” rating, a report on assessment center performance, and psychological evaluations. A 360-degree rating involves confidential surveys about the candidate’s performance, attitudes, and competencies completed by peers, current and former bosses, and subordinates. Assessment centers are formal training events designed to evaluate many candidates simultaneously during a simulated work setting. Company personnel and business experts ask the participants to “run a company” and to solve several business issues. At the conclusion of the exercise, they provide feedback to the participants concerning their performance, as well as suggestions for improvement. The company also receives a summary report on the candidates’ performance. Then, a management committee charged with running the succession plan reviews the information to determine each candidate’s potential for having a successful management career, and for rising up the management ranks. The committee also evaluates the candidate’s readiness level—how long before a candidate will be ready to assume greater responsibility and authority.
Those with sufficient potential and acceptable readiness levels are assigned a personal mentor or patron who is responsible for overseeing the company’s investment in this person. Together, they create an individual development plan that outlines the growth and improvement needs of the candidates based on the ratings, as well as personal information, such as aspirations and any career constraints, including geographic preferences and family commitments. Recommendations for improvement often include training programs, rotational assignments, special projects, and regular meetings with a professional coach.
Those with high-level potential receive job rotations through a variety of departments, such as finance, sales, marketing, research, human resources, and manufacturing, in order to provide them with a broader understanding of the business. Many companies also require the completion of international assignments, which will give the candidates exposure to different cultures, languages, and sets of business problems.
As the reader can appreciate, formal succession planning provides multiple assessments from a variety of sources across a lengthy period of time in a variety of job functions, thus assuring that almost every aspect of the future leader’s behavior has been reviewed and cross-checked. If the reader feels that the process is quite bureaucratic, this is in fact the case. Succession planning systems originated during the period when bureaucracy was the organization model in vogue. Succession planning was an attempt to improve the chances of making the right promotional choices while removing cronyism, nepotism, and other “old boy network” influences from the process. Formal succession planning is one of the few bureaucratic processes that transitional companies can benefit from and should retain.
However, and this is a big however, we would argue that there are still some risks involved, as the very nature of the process can be taken advantage of by manipulative employees. One problem is that corporate psychopaths already on staff have had a significant amount of time to establish a cadre of supporters, an influence network, some of them patrons who advocate for the psychopaths’ candidacy, others pawns who do their work for them. The second problem is the disinformation spread by the psychopaths, with the express purpose of disparaging rivals and enhancing themselves in the eyes of management.
Companies can do several things to counter these problems. First, the management committee should take every opportunity to interact with management development and succession planning candidates personally, and (this is critical) solicit confidential and anonymous information from those who are in the best position to provide it, including supervisors, peers, and subordinates. It is always possible that some misinformation will be included even in well-prepared plans, but by increasing the number of sources and balancing their perceptions, any perceived discrepancies should raise any red flags and prompt further review and validation.
Second, companies should avoid identifying only one person per position for grooming. This approach, called the “crown prince/princess approach” by experts, almost guarantees that once identified, a candidate, psychopathic or not, will obtain the higher-level job without the added security of internal comparison. To avoid this, management should identify several candidates for each important position, creating a talent pool in which no one person is certain of obtaining the promotion.
A third approach would be to include additional psychological assessments, such as interviews and written tests designed to measure personality traits. It is important that the psychological assessment be considered just one source of data in the list of criteria used to make its promotional decision as, in the end, it is the performance and observed behavior of the candidates that should be the deciding factors.
Finally, it is critical to review carefully and challenge repeatedly all data to ascertain their validity: were goals actually attained, projects completed on time and within budget, increase in sales and revenues reported correctly? Following this, it is important to evaluate the human cost. Did the candidate leave a trail of bodies in his or her wake, or, instead, inspire others to take on a challenge and come through with success? When considering management and executive candidates, verify the record of accomplishment in important competency areas.
Handling Challenges to Organizational Responsibility and Effectiveness
Executives face challenges every day as a routine part of their job. Their ability to meet these challenges goes beyond whether they are good at specific technical competencies. Broadly speaking, executives must make organizationally responsible choices, and be judged by how effective these choices are in advancing the aims of the corporation. Over time, a pattern of responses will define the “true” person. While individual lapses in judgment may garner attention in many cases, the ability of psychopaths to cover or explain away their individual decisions makes evidence of these lapses difficult to obtain. Rather, it is the long-term impact of their behaviors in a variety of situations and their dealings with a variety of people that can shed more light on who they really are. The choices made in response to organizational challenges provide a clear picture of the person as a future executive.
Some “Red Flags” to Consider
The following list gives the reader a sense of some of the long-term consequences of psychopathic features that might occur in a business setting. While no single consequence is necessarily indicative of psychopathy, all of them are problematic if not addressed in training and coaching sessions. At the very least, evidence of these outcomes should send up the “red flag” and warrant further investigation and evaluation.
Inability to Form a Team
The most debilitating characteristic of even the most well-behaved psychopath is an inability to form a workable team. This occurs in narcissistic and Machiavellian businesspeople as well as in psychopaths. The inability to form a team is a critical factor in career derailment, a reflection of an unwillingness and inability to collaborate with others, especially with those whom they see as adversaries. Being highly competitive, and in the name of the “good fight,” they withhold or distort information to the detriment of the team and ultimately the company. They will often exhibit disruptive tactics and behaviors designed to either take over the team themselves or disturb the working of others.
As they prefer to manipulate others in private one-on-one meetings, psychopaths will attempt to derail a team before the first meeting by challenging the need for the team itself, offering typical organizational rationales (for example, “meetings are a waste of time”) to buttress their disruption—but crafted to sound as if they have the company’s best interest at heart. Alternatively, they may participate in a halfhearted manner, showing up late and making a dramatic entrance, or perhaps even leaving in the middle of the meeting to do tasks that are “more important.” They are highly competitive and unwilling to listen to the directives of anyone whom they cannot value (i.e., those who do not have high utility for their career). They berate members of the team, disrupt the team’s progress by distracting it from its purpose, and openly criticize the team, its objectives, and individual teammates. Recall that psychopaths believe they possess higher status than do others and will treat coworkers like pawns in their drama. The best sources of information about these disruptions are the other team members, themselves.
Of course, when teamwork is in their own interest (for example, as a platform for bravado and grandstanding) they will attempt to dominate others. Predictably, they attack other team members and sabotage the leader, lacing their complaints with examples of such poor leadership that they had to take over and save the project. In doing so, they often come across as bullying. The psychopath will tell you he is a real “team player”—but there really is only one member of his team!
With a dysfunctional executive or psychopath in charge, others will see decreases in morale, productivity, and cohesion. Some team members will transfer off the team and in rare cases resign. Confidential conversations by senior executives of each member of a dysfunctional team will often uncover the source of the problem.
Inability to Share
Living peacefully in a civilized society requires the citizenry to share a variety of life-sustaining resources. Likewise, corporate citizens need to share resources in the interest of the greater good, reflected in higher profits, job security, or a stress-free workplace. Because they do not see others as equals or as having any legitimate claim to resources, psychopaths (as well as some narcissists and Machiavellians) see no need to share; they see sharing anything as giving up too much power. In fact, their parasitic, competitive nature drives them to siphon off resources from others, often for their own personal use.
Not sharing information is a common offense, in particular, and is often justified by a “need to know” rationale. While certain governmental agencies charged with national security can operate in this mode, keeping secrets from one’s boss or a subordinate in most organizations is not justified. “The right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing” is a common embarrassment in organizations under the best of circumstances. Purposefully creating such dilemmas is contrary to organizational success and leads to dysfunction.
Psychopaths who keep others “out of the loop” use the power this gives them to their own personal advantage. Keeping others in the dark makes them look stupid and is a form of neutralization. For example, “They wouldn’t understand” was the condescending rationale used by one psychopath we met; another claimed to be protecting the department from the disruptions of a coworker, stating, “She would only get upset and then we’d have a bigger problem,” a statement designed to bolster the psychopath’s superiority and plant the seeds of distrust of the “emotional” coworker. Clearly, comments that discount the value of others, especially their ability to think and reason as equals, are consistent with the elevated (grandiose) self-perceptions psychopaths have of themselves. They are too self-centered to see the danger of this approach, let alone its unfairness or unethical nature.
An extension of the inability to share information is the inability to share credit with others (unless there is some benefit to the psychopath). Credit sharing can be difficult to measure, as upper management does not have easy access to the truth about the relative contributions of employees. Complaints from coworkers, who feel they are contributing to the outcome but not getting proper credit, may be the only hint that something is amiss. Supervisors and human resources staff should pay attention to complaints of this kind, some of which may turn out to be groundless. Others may uncover serious managerial and morale problems.
Disparate Treatment of Staff
Because psychopaths see people playing different roles in their psychopathic drama (that is, Pawns, Patrons, Patsies, and Police), they will treat some better than others. The individuals involved may be alone in knowing about this disparate, and often subtle, treatment. In addition, for reasons explained in the next chapter, victims may never come forward to report their feelings. As a result, it may take a very long time for coworkers and management to figure out what is really going on, if they do so at all.
Unfortunately, the corporate psychopath readily explains away and justifies even the most egregious treatment. For example, one psychopathic manager promoted a junior staff member as a reward for her good work, even though another person in the department had more experience and was more deserving of the promotion. The psychopath considered the one passed over as a rival because she had received some positive attention from others in the company. The promotion of the inexperienced staffer was an attempt to block the potential rival’s career and to guarantee continued support from an obedient, indebted junior person.
In a similar case, an individual who had been in a supervisory position for only three years was nominated as a high potential with an eye toward taking a position as vice president within the next two years. Although there were more qualified people in the organization than the individual, the psychopathic nominator was able to persuade the succession committee to select his choice. In this case, he spent a considerable amount of money, from a limited fund, on developmental activities over the objections of others on the committee. At the end of two years, the “high-potential” candidate was no more ready to assume the responsibilities of a vice president’s job than he was at the time of his nomination. When not promoted he left in disgust, having been promised a great career by his psychopathic boss.
In a third case, a truly high-potential secretary worked for a boss who was well connected politically, but completely incompetent. Realizing the talent of his secretary, he promoted her into an assistant position and began giving her increasingly larger projects to complete. On the surface, this looked like good management practice and the employee was highly motivated, worked toward an MBA at night at a well-respected school, and completed each assignment perfectly. Over time, it became clear to the assistant that her boss really did not know what he was doing and was giving her work that he should be doing. She persevered, though, thinking that management would eventually recognize her achievements. However, with the increase in responsibility came badgering, abuse, and, ultimately, bullying. Wanting to do a good job, and still learning to be more confident in her own abilities, the assistant took the abuse, convincing herself that she had to pay her dues; meanwhile her psychopathic boss was taking all of the credit. She eventually learned that her boss had been complaining about her so much and so often—blaming her for failures on projects not assigned to her—that she would never be a candidate for promotion. In fact, she had come close to termination on more than one occasion. The human resources staff member she complained to was surprised that she had no knowledge of her “poor performance record.” All she had ever heard was that there was more for her to learn; all HR heard was that she was an incompetent secretary put into a role over her head.
Inability to Tell the Truth
Pathological lying is a hallmark of psychopaths, as the reader knows. They cross back and forth easily between lying and honesty during conversations because they do not have the guilty feelings the rest of us have when we try to tell a lie. They weave their lies with a thread of truth, and, if questioned, they indignantly mount a convincing defense. Honesty is one of the most important traits in a manager. Yet, we have almost never seen an executive’s file in which the ratings of honest and ethical behavior were less than perfect.
The problem is twofold. First, it is unpleasant and not socially acceptable to accuse someone of dishonest or unethical behavior. Second, just how do you measure honesty? Psychopaths can easily slip through the fog by appearing honest and ethical on the surface, yet doing things that many would agree are dishonest and unethical if they knew about them. On the other hand, an organization can forgive mistakes if the perceived intention was honest and motivated by the best interest of the company. However, psychopaths often use this excuse to get themselves out of a lie, making it difficult to separate the honest employee from the dishonest.
Inability to Be Modest
Not everyone is modest, although it is an admirable trait where it exists. Modest people do not brag about their accomplishments, but typically enjoy doing a good job for its own sake or accept only an occasional pat on the back as a reward. Many who are modest shun the spotlight, preferring to let the record speak for itself. Both narcissists and Machiavellians tend to be immodest, but it is the psychopath’s immodesty, coupled with arrogance, that stands out so clearly to coworkers. Unfortunately, when dealing with higher-ups, the ability of psychopaths to manage and promote their arrogant self-perceptions, and to package themselves as self-confident and strong leaders, effectively hides their true nature. Genuine modesty among psychopaths is almost nonexistent. Its absence in an executive, while not an indication of psychopathy directly, can help to corroborate other suspicions.
Inability to Accept Blame
Taking responsibility for one’s own mistakes and not blaming others is highly valued in corporations, as well as in society. Psychopaths rarely, if ever, take responsibility for their actions, even if they clearly made mistakes or their actions and decisions led to failures. However, they go a few steps farther; they will routinely blame others and create “evidence” that others are to blame. Clearly, this is a form of lying and quite different from the shifting of blame or pointing fingers that most of us sometimes engage in. This is active, instrumental aggression. Because it is hard to uncover covert blaming, it often takes a series of failed projects under the functional control of the psychopath to produce any significant evidence of incompetence or wrongdoing.
Inability to Act Consistently and Predictably
We are all more comfortable with people who are somewhat predictable. Businesses need to know that those working for them will show up at work, perform their jobs according to accepted safety and quality standards, get along with others, and not disrupt the work of others. Even creative types, who may surprise us with their idiosyncrasies, may appear predictable once we understand their day-to-day work habits. What a business cannot afford are “loose cannons,” individuals who wreak havoc on the normal flow of business and social intercourse amongst other employees. They disrupt meetings, embarrass others and the company, make erratic decisions, change course seemingly without reason, and surprise even the most seasoned. Few executives like surprises, often priding themselves on being aware of the goings-on in their business. Loose cannons can be an executive’s worst nightmare.
Unless one truly understands the machinations of corporate psychopaths, it is almost impossible to predict what they will do. Rarely are others privy to the inner workings of their mind, making them potentially dangerous employees to have on staff.
Inability to React Calmly
The ability to remain calm during a crisis is the hallmark of good leadership, and psychopaths are quite adept at maintaining their cool when in situations observed by those in power. Yet when out of view, they can overreact in socially inappropriate ways, and many who observe this phenomenon will describe them as being dramatic. Although occasional outbursts by supervisors, such as when responding to a dangerous safety violation, are acceptable and even expected, psychopaths tend to overreact in response to perceived personal insults or when insufficient respect is given them. This harms the work group, and ultimately the company, because it puts everyone on notice they must treat the psychopath with kid gloves. Groups subjected to dramatic bosses often lose their cohesion and team spirit, falling back on an “every man for himself” mentality.
Because psychopaths are able to moderate this behavior while in the presence of authority they respect, it can go unnoticed for considerable amounts of time—until they move on and the stories start to emerge. Unfortunately, the only evidence available before a psychopath’s departure is rumors and tension in the department. Insightful HR organizations can learn more about what is really going on if they follow up on such information.
Inability to Act Without Aggression
Bullying, coercion, and intimidation have no place in business; they disrupt work, hurt people, and are unfair to those who cannot defend themselves. However, learning about this type of behavior is often difficult unless targets and victims come forward. Because of the legal ramifications of such behavior, many companies institute no-bullying policies and create confidential mechanisms for affected employees to report this behavior. Formalized Codes of Conduct often have provisions concerning bullying and intimidation. In some European countries, it is also against the law. To be effective, though, it is important to communicate to all the policy and the procedure for reporting violations. In particular, supervisors and managers need to learn how to recognize bullying, coercion, and intimidation, and how to deal effectively with them.
Discussion Questions
S 11.1
Does Practice Make Perfect?
Hare consulted with Nicole Kidman on the movie Malice. She wanted to let the audience know, early in the film, that she was not the sweet, warm person she appeared to be. He gave her the following scene: “You’re walking down the street and come across an accident at the corner. A young child, struck by a car, is lying in a pool of blood. You walk up to the accident site, look briefly at the child, and then focus on the grief-stricken mother. After a few minutes of careful scrutiny, you walk back to your apartment, go into the bathroom, stand in front of the mirror, and practice mimicking the facial expressions and body language of the mother.”
Of course, this scenario is not unique in suggesting that psychopaths learn to mimic emotions they themselves do not fully experience. As Cleckley (p. 374)3 put it, the psychopath “can learn to use ordinary words . . . [and] will also learn to reproduce appropriately all the pantomime of feeling, but the feeling itself does not come to pass.”
In Bill Watterson’s comic strip Calvin and Hobbes, Susie tells Calvin that he is lying and that it’s written all over his face. Calvin rushes home and practices his facial expressions before the mirror.
In a scene in the 1956 film The Bad Seed, eight-year-old Rhoda Penmark poses in front of a mirror, ostensibly learning to mimic the expressions of those watching her. Similarly, in the 2018 remake of The Bad Seed, when Rhoda (renamed Emma Grossman) is asked by her father, “What would you give me for a basket of hugs?” She replies, “A basket of kisses.” She practices saying “Basket of kisses! Basket of kisses! Basket of kisses!” in front of a mirror while trying on different smiles. The result is a poor attempt at a genuine (Duchenne) smile (see S 12.1: Psychopathic Interviews). For a psychopath, practice may help, but some observers will see through the simulations of emotions.
S 11.2
Politics and Poker: A License to Lie
In poker, a tell is verbal or body language that conveys information about the hand another player holds. Good poker players spend a lot of time learning to detect the tells of their opponents.
Do psychopaths emit tells that provide others with useful information about themselves? It appears that some do. In Without Conscience, Hare described many examples in which some people feel uncomfortable in the presence of psychopaths, whom he described as social predators. Although they may be unable to “put their finger” on what bothered them, many commented that it was a predatory stare and empty eyes that made them feel as if they were lunch. This is a common theme in accounts of psychopathic interactions in true crime books.
Other nonverbal behaviors include the tendency of psychopaths to intrude into and dominate our personal space, mimic emotions, use excessive hand gestures during emotional speech, and generally put on a good show.4 Can such behaviors function as tells?
Leanne ten Brinke and colleagues5 examined the emotional facial expressions, body language, and verbal content of the video clips of offenders with PCL-R scores. One of their main interests was the use of Duchenne smiles (upturned lip corners with cheek raiser activation, which creates crow’s-feet around the eyes). Most people view a Duchenne smile as an authentic, genuine, and trustworthy expression of happiness or delight.6 However, compared with other offenders, those with high psychopathy scores exhibited more Duchenne smiles, more hand gestures, and more angry emotional language.
Were the psychopathic offenders happier than were other offenders? Apparently not. With practice, Duchenne smiles are easy to fake (see S 11.1: Does Practice Make Perfect?). Further, psychopathic offenders used Duchenne smiles while using angry emotional language. Naive observers noticed this behavioral incongruence and were quite successful in identifying the psychopathic offenders. As ten Brinke and colleagues (p. 273)7 commented, “Interestingly, such impression management tactics may result in a behavioral profile marked by inconsistency—wherein one aspect of more psychopathic individuals’ behavior reveals their true nature (e.g., the use of negative, or angry words), which is contradicted by their attempts at behavioral control (e.g., the expression of charming happiness, to appear friendly and be disarming).” The definition that ten Brinke and colleagues gave to the naive observers was “Factor 1—People high in Factor 1 psychopathy tend to have an inflated sense of self-importance, to be ‘smooth talkers’ and to lie and manipulate others without feeling guilty. They lack empathy for other people, and rarely accept responsibility for the things they do wrong.”